Stress & Food Intolerance

What Is Food Allergy & Food Intolerance?

Food allergy is a term that health experts reserve for any abnormal reaction by the body’s disease-fighting immune system to an otherwise harmless food or component of food.

Only a small fraction of the population has a genuine allergic reaction to food. In fact, in North America, only about 5 to 8 percent of children and 2 percent of adults have a true food allergy.

Food intolerance is when a reaction to a food occurs that does not involve the body’s immune system. This is not a food allergy.

Food intolerance stems from problems with digestion or metabolism. Usually the problem involves a defect or deficiency in an enzyme in the body, a chemical necessary for the breakdown or absorption of a particular food deficiency.

While food intolerance can be unpleasant, it’s rarely dangerous.

Individuals who have genuine food allergies, however, need to know which foods to avoid, how to recognize the symptoms of an allergic attack, and how to take steps to prevent or short-circuit a severe allergic reaction.

The Food Intolerance Network is a not-for-profit organisation with over 6,500 members mostly in Australia and New Zealand and provide independent information about the effects of food on behaviour, health and learning ability in both children and adults, and support for families using a low-chemical elimination diet free of additives, low in salicylates, amines and flavour enhancers (FAILSAFE) for health, behaviour and learning problems. An important part of our work is lobbying government regulators and raising priority issues with politicians.

Food intolerance may be latent until your 20s, 30s, 40s or beyond. Food-intolerant people have low levels of secretory IgA, antibodies found in their gut. IgA antibodies protect the body against the entry of foreign substances. Researchers have found that after emotional stress, such as birth of a child, death of a family member, divorce or sickness, people can become lactose, fructose or gluten intolerant. Stress leads to a decrease in secretory IgA. You are also liable to develop food intolerances if someone in your family is food intolerant.

Food Allergy results in an allergic reaction that tends to be immediate, and often dramatic and likely to be a long term or permanent condition.

Autism & ADHD

Several studies on groups of autistic children have provided evidence suggesting high rates of protein based food intolerance.

Research on children with attention deficit syndrome identified nutritional deficits associated with high dietary intakes of processed foods including breakfast cereals, bread, biscuits, and snack items. These foods contain refined carbohydrates, preservatives, residual hormones, pesticide, and other toxic contaminants.

Children on processed foods exhibited higher rates of anti-social and aggressive behaviours compared to those on a whole food diet consisting of complex carbohydrates, fresh organic vegetables, and lean beef and poultry.

Treating Food Intolerance

The standard treatment for food intolerance is to determine those foods which initiate symptoms and to eliminate or strictly control the amounts consumed. Often it may be a change in diet to Gluten-free, Dairy-free, Yeast-free, Fructose-free or Wheat-free and symptoms will disappear.

Each individual case will be unique. One case may be intolerant to milk but able to consume yoghurt and cheese with safety. Another may react to all dairy foods without exception.

*Please seek professional diagnosis and treatment for any suspected cases of food intolerance.*

Food intolerance on the increase

Most varieties of processed foods are strongly associated with food intolerance, particularly those high in refined carbohydrate, saturated fat, and multiple chemical additives.